Bury Me in San Antone

A week ago today we won best film at the Urban Suburban in Philadelphia. This was a great way to start the week and I was looking forward to another fest in San Antonio this weekend. It was their 15th festival. It's at the Mexican Cultural Institute in a park in the center of town. The screening space looked good, website looked good. Unfortunately, I was unaware of the job requirement in San Antonio that you had to not know how to actually perform your job and you had to be smug about it. This goes for valets, barristas and festival directors.

I was told an hour before screening that the film wouldn't play. We send standard def copies as submissions but for screeners we send blu-rays. The director said we didn't communicate that to him and that they didn't have a blu-ray player. He said his house was a half hour away and that's where the submission copy was so I said I would buy a blu-ray player if that's what we needed to. He said sure but made sure to scold me several times for my poor communication and to let me know that this was my film and if I wanted to...I've got 45 mins. now to find a DVD player in a town I've never been to, I don't really need to listen to your crap.

So, I left my family and friends who had come to see the film and raced out on foot in the 106 degree weather to the mall and found the last existing Sam Goody store and they had one blu-ray but I didn't have my wallet. My glorious friend Brent bought the player which they assured us we could return if it didn't suit our needs and we raced back. I checked the DVD that we had sent which was clearly marked Blu-Ray on the case and on the disc (bad communication, indeed) and we screened the film until it froze with about 30 seconds to go. The projectionist, who was a great guy by the way, started it up after a couple of minutes and everyone got to watch the last line and the credits.

The Q&A went well. Good questions, attentive audience and then I had to rush back out to the mall, again ignoring family and friends to find that we could return it but only for the same model. Which we did. Brent then promptly took the new, unopened box to (get this, there are 2 Sam Goody's still in San Antonio) and actually made money on the deal because they had given him some bizarre discount at the first store. So, when you see that Sam Goody, Suncoast, fye.com are finally out of business, you will know that those 30 dollars had something to do with it.

So, I'm looking forward to Anaheim where we'll be screening in a multiplex, the AMC Disney. We get a percentage of the box ofc. if we sell out. They have a website where I can post my trailer and edit my own info. Very professional seeming. We'll see.